The Republican journal., 1887-04-21
The Mounds and Mound Builders
PREHISTORIC OHIO.
BY PROF. l.. c. BATEMAN.


IIoratio, than are lrcamt of in your phoso-
phy.' Words more pregnant with meaning
were never spoken by man. The English
| speaking races are Il queer combination Of
skcpticism and faith. We blindly accept the
| most ridiculous ideas that come to us hoary
with age and stamped with ecclesiastical author
ity, while stcrnly rejecting facts that almost
be proved with historical and mathematical
accuracy. Let hieroglyphc inscription be
found OH some Syrian temple and delegation
of learned theoIogians are Immediately dis
patched to see if it can possibly be twisted into
| the support of some old bible story. Let a
| Mound be found in Ohio, the history of which
would carry the human race back tens of
| thousands of years, and the discovery is met
| with Il howl of tlerision, or the more Wither-
| ing reception of silent contempt. Ignorance
and blind fanaticsnl, however, are gradually
melting away beneath the sunny rays of a
brighter age. The glacial period Of intellectual
thought is giving way to the age of reason.
Men are no longer contented with the dry
F! hu>k> Of dogmatic assertion. One by one facts
arc coming to light which clearly prove the
truthfuness of the quotation with which this
letter began One by one the great lights Of
history fade away, and the heroic achievements
which delighted our childhood days become but
a fairy tale. The startling fact is just bursting
| upon us that Columbus did not discover new
worl,! he simply rc-dScovered an OLD one.
While the sunny plains Of CASTLE were yet i'll
| habitcd by the cave bear and the nastodon,
there existed in America Il civilization far
advanced in the arts and sciences. Here lived,
labored and loved, Il race of people of superior
Intelligence, while the shores of distant Cathay
were yet plunged in the night of barbarism.
Here are the mighty ruins of Il forgotten civli-
zation which existed long before Homer sang
the exploits of Achilles. or the Northern Goth
had descended from the shores of the Baltic.
| Among the thousands of intelligent readers of
| the journal it is doubtful if there is one who
has not heard of the far-famed Mounds in
Ohio. But il will undoubtedly he a surprise to
many when | make the statement that in this
State alone there has been found over ten
Thousand of these gigantic remains of Il lost or
prehistoric race. Who these people were,
from whence they came. and whittier they dis
| appeared, are questions that have never been
that civilization is a plant Of slow growth.
Thousands of years must roll away before the
| savage can even learn to cnumcrate or invent
| an alphabet. We find TO evidence that these
| Mound Builders ever passed through this period
of evolution. From their first appearance i'll
America they We're Il civilized race. This fact
| is conclusive evidence that they We're trans
| jIJt tDH i btI tI,r\V "a
| Older and more advanced civilization. The
| question is. from whence came the parent
| stock: \ thousand conyergi:ig rays of lighta
! centre in one Spot--the lost .iU0ntis! Here is
| the only rational solution of the great ethno-
| logical problems of the human race. There
| can he little doubt that long ages since large
| island or continent stretched from the Mcdi-
| tcrr;nean sea almost to the shores of America.
| Upon that island there existed highly civilized
| race. possessed of all the arts and sciences
| which tend to the happiness of mankind. by
| some mighty convul>ion in nature that island
with its countless people. lis splendid cities.
and its treasures of art sank into the depths Of
| old ocean. The AZorc islands are but the
| mountain peaks of this lost Atlantis. This is
no fairy tale. History adds its weight to an
abundance of other evidence corroborating this
theory. The Grecian philosopher, Plato, has
| given us Il graphic and minute description Of
| the island of Atlantis. His knowledge was
| derived from his ancestor, Solon, who visited
Egypt and had the story direct from the lips of
| the priests who administered the far-famci
| mysteries of Eleu>>. Here is one extract from
| Plates story: "CroSsin. the outer harhors,
| which We're three in number, you would come
to Il wall which began at the sea and went all
around the island this was everywhere distant
| fifty stadia from the largest one, and enclosed
| the whole, niectinga at the mouth of the channel
| toward the sea. The entire area was denselv
crowded with labitaton>; and the canal and
| the largest Of the liarbors We're full of vessels
and merchants coming from all parts. who.
| from their numbers, kept up a multiudinouS
souMd OF human voices and din of all sort.
night and day. Here, too. was the temple of
| Po>eilon. a stadium in length and half >tad-
um in width, and decorated with the utmost
| >plcndor All the outside of the temple they
covered with silver, and the pnnacles with
gold In the interior of the temple the roof
WAS Of ivory, adorned everywhere with gold,
silver and orchalcum.'' There is nothing in
this story OF Plato that is improbable. Had he
drawn this description from his own imagina-
ton there would have been striking similarity
to Grccian mythology. We should then have
| had Il narrative full of the wonderful doingS Of
| nymphs faunS, and satyrs--of gods, gorgonS,
geni, and giants. There is nothing of the
kind. 1t is plain, straightforward story of Il
race of men who built cities and canals, who
titled the soil and went down to the in ships.
Neither is it improbable from scientific stand
point. Geology teaches us that Great Britain
was once fifteen hundred feet beneath the level
of the ocean. II arose again from the sea and
Oh its bosom were those vast deposits of gravel,
sand and clay known as the great IN orthern
Drift 1nnumerable. also, are the traditions
and legends of this great catastrophe. The
Bible story of the flood has its counterpart in
every branch of the three great civilized races
of ancient timcs-thc Aryan, Semitic, and
Cusltc. \ recollection thus precise and con-
cordant cannot be Il myth voluntarily invented.
No falschood ever presented this character of
universally. 1t could only have arisen from
some rearand terrible event, so powerfully i'm
pressing the imagination of the ancestors of
our race rs never to have been forgotten by
their descendants. From its physical impoSSi-
bility the usually accepted MeologicM idea OF
the flood can 10 longer be entertained by amy
rational and well informed man. The idea that
civilized races, far advanced in the arts and
sciences, could have existed before the water,
had fairly subsidized around the ark upon the
summit of Ararat, is too supremely ridiculou,
for serious consideration. The only explanation
is that these legends refer to the Slbmcrgencl
and destruction of some portion of the eartl'>
surface. The traditions of the Jews. Chal,leanS
Egyptians, Arabians, and the various branches
of the lndo-European family all point in the
direction Of Atlantis. Here was the cradle OF
the human race. and here originated many OF
those beautiful and useful inventions known ~
the ''Io>t arts The kings and queens, tn,
adyenturers and heroes of Atlantis, became til,
gods and godlesscs, the gorgons and giants OF
the offspring races that survived the parent
stock. The earliest colony of Atlantis wa,
planted upon the banks of the Nile. The torcl
of civilization passed from Egypt t.
Greece, from Greece to Rome, and with Rome
. peri>hcd beneath the iron heel of religion,
, superstition. Another colony from Atlantis
| starting westward DllShe,l IN he Amazon river